Capital Health demand for NSGEU nurses to confess is rescinded

Joan Jessome, president of the Nova Scotia Government and General Employees Union, speaks to reporters at the union’s Dartmouth office last Thursday. Jessome said Tuesday that she’s not surprised Capital Health backed off its demand for letters from nurses who staged a wildcat strike April 1. (TIM KROCHAK / Staff)

Capital Health has withdrawn its directive to dozens of unionized nurses that they write confession-like letters regarding last month’s wildcat strike in the Halifax region.

The district health authority backed off Tuesday, saying there’s now no need for the registered nurses to pen a mea culpa regarding patient safety during the illegal strike on April 1.

According to a letter from the employer made public by the Nova Scotia Government & General Employees Union, nurses don’t have to write anything acknowledging they allegedly violated professional ethics by taking part in the controversial job action.

Management’s decision followed the receipt of a policy grievance from the union, Capital Health’s notice says.

“We have discussed the merits of this grievance and, in consultation with the NSGEU employee relations officer, we have reconsidered our position and have agreed to rescind this particular requirement,” says Capital Health’s letter from Bruce English, the authority’s director of people services.

The employer’s original hardline edict to have nurses write notes admitting they risked patient safety during the brief wildcat walkout had outraged union members.

Union president Joan Jessome said Monday it was a form of humiliation. She said Tuesday she wasn’t surprised by Capital Health’s quick about-face.

“It was really overboard what they did, by requesting nurses write a humiliation letter,” Jessome said. She added “the backlash they got — certainly from their nurses — was unbelievable.”

Capital Health has been having disciplinary meetings with some of the more than 200 nurses who took part in the wildcat strike. The union said last week that management handed several nurses two-day suspensions for participating in the unlawful walkout.

Jessome acknowledged many more union members are to receive suspensions and said each will be grieved.

English said this week about 40 nurses whose absence would have had a more significant impact on patients were instructed to write letters. Jessome said individual union members were to receive help from their union regarding written replies.

“We drafted a letter that we were going to give to the nurses that they could respond with,” she said.

English’s note rescinding the direction to nurses to provide letters said it was the employer’s intention to obtain a “written reflection describing how actions taken that day (of the walkout) affected patient care. … This would be an opportunity to consider what might be done differently in the future.”

In an interview, English said after reviewing the union’s policy grievance, Capital Health officials decided “in the end it wasn’t necessary” to have nurses submit letters. “So we rescinded the letter.”

The labour dispute between the Capital district health authority and the union’s Local 97 involves about 2,400 registered nurses who mainly staff the Queen Elizabeth II Health Sciences Centre, Nova Scotia Hospital, East Coast Forensic Hospital and Public Health Services.